The Dawn of the Wolf
by Samkin-lone-Senshi
Summary: Takes place between 1945, 1987 to 1997, there are some crossovers, but not much. This is Rip’s life up to 1999 and her death on board the HMS Eagle in volume 5 of Hellsing.


Dawn of the Wolf Dawn of the Wolf

Part 1: The Final Orders for a Human

1945

The last thing Rip remembered before waking up in the hospital was pain, she remembered running, she remembered it had been snowing out. She slipped a little and someone caught her, she saw that the person who caught her by the arm was one of the other sniper units dragging her up the mountain. "Lt. Rip, come on!" he was yelling over his shoulder pulling her up.

She knew that it had been days since she last had food, she had fled the lab just as allied troops had stormed the place. She had hoped that the Doctor and his group had already evacuated the building, she dashed into the darkness ahead without a second thought. "Lt. Rip van Winkle!" she heard someone yelling for her to duck, that was when something caught her in the back.

She felt a flash of red hot pain going down her legs, she felt as if someone had just tripped her, she lay in the snow, it was cold, but somehow warm at the same time. "We found another one!" Someone was yelling. "What should we do?"

"Is he dead?" someone asked as she felt someone turning her over.

"It's a woman," another person reported. "She's still breathing."

She felt herself being pulled onto a gurney. "Damn, she's bleeding everywhere, get her to the medics."

Damn Americans, don't touch me, she wanted to scream out, but all she got out was a squeak. She wanted to scream, she wanted to her musket, the one her grandfather so proudly handed down from one generation to the next.

She woke somehow in a bed, she was wearing a hospital prison nightgown, she stared around her in confusion. "Your name is Rip van Winkle, is that correct?" a man dressed as an American US Army doctor asked in German.

She nodded, but in truth, she had no idea what was going on. "Vhere am I?"

"You are at the women's prison," he explained the situation to her. "You will be incarcerated for seven months considering that we opted that you were simply following orders and had no idea what you were doing. Secondly, you are to remain in the prison hospital until you are fit enough to go before the rest of your fellow prisoners."

She let out a partial moan, she knew this meant she was a prisoner of the allies, or either that the war was lost. She shook her head and decided to move a little, but found that she could not move her legs, they were motionless before her. She let out a horrible cry and scream as she felt around. "Vot happened to me?"

"I'm sorry, but you're paralyzed, you were shot in the back, you're lucky you can move the upper part of your body," the American explained what happened and she started to cry.

When did this all go wrong for me? She thought horribly as she fell back onto her bed and moaned, she simply had no stomach for this amount of bad news. She pulled her head under the pillows and felt the man's hand. "Listen, I can speak to a judge and see if he can just decrease your sentence to three months. I'm sure that there is a chance they might think you were simply using the German uniform as away of going hunting, Ms. Van Winkle."

"Makes no difference! A month, six months, makes no difference, I can't valk!" she yelled into the pillow biting it. "It von't bring my legs back!" She sobbed into the pillows and heard the sound of people outside the room.

For a day or two she went in and out of consciousness, she had visitors, her mother, father, brothers, but it made no difference. She in their eyes was a traitor, they reasoned with her to agree to any sort of prison sentence, but she just sat there numb to everything. She hardly even ate anything at all, she felt like her body just was giving up.

One evening she knew that she was not supposed to have visitor. "The visitation hours are over," she called out to the darkness, but somehow whoever was in the room was moving toward her.

"Are you Untersturmführer Rip van Winkle?" the words were spoken softly, she straightened in her bed. "Are you?"

She nodded slowly as the person who looked more wolf than man walked up to her, he blinked at her. "A lame wolf isn't good," he whispered to her. "I vas sent by the Major to give you some orders."

"The get me out of this mad house!" she attempted to move, then remembered that her legs were paralyzed. "I can't move."

"You will soon enough," he whispered. "The last order you are to follow as a human is…" he moved quickly pulling her into his arms, that was when she felt him pull his hand over her mouth as she tried to let out a scream. "to die," he whispered into her ear as she saw a needle filled with a strange fluid entering her neck.

Letting out a gurgling sound, she fell back on the bed, she felt her body shaking, she could not focus, she could not see anyone. The man carried her from the room, she was aware of being carried.

* * *

1987

"We're almost done, Doc, she's almost able to move without a problem," someone was talking, Rip could hear the sound of electricity around her, she was aware that she felt like she was choking, then she suddenly let out a scream. For a few moments, she was aware again, somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew something was not right, somewhere in this room she could see someone, which was odd, she never could have good vision without her glasses. Out of instinct she reached for them, she pulled them on and looked around.

The room was a laboratory. "Congratulations are in order, we have the last vampire to wake up," she heard Doc chiming in. "This is the first in a line of new vampires who have the modified chip."

"Vhat the hell? Vhere am I?" she yelled finally aware that people were soon looking at her. She pulled herself from the lab table and then suddenly looked in shock as she was walking around. "Vait!"

"Oh, right, she couldn't valk before," Doc walked away. "As you can see, herr major, ve restored almost 90 of her body to its orginal state."

Staring in shock, Rip looked around the room, her joy was replaced with a strange urge, she looked around her in surprise. That was when she saw someone holding up a package of something red, she snatched it and saw who was holding it, a boy with cat ears. "Have a good meal," he giggled and vanished.

She suddenly bit into the package and tasted for the first time blood, her eyes widened at what she was doing, then she finished it. She suddenly looked around again, as if wanting another. "Vell she has been asleep for 42 years, give her more blood," someone was commenting as they walked up to her, holding another package. She was kneeling on the floor completely confused.

"Blitz, is that you?" she gasped out in surprise, the one person she did not want to see was there.

"Ja, its me," the other woman smiled, her impossibly short blond hair was nicely spiked up and offered Rip another package of blood. "Come on, take it, I von't need it."

* * *

It occurred later in the day as Rip walked through the lab as to why she was still unaware of anything around her. She knew who Blitz was, she knew who Doc was, but she had no idea who the boy was. She saw the boy maybe a few times, but never got his name. "That's Schrodinger," Blitz told her everything that had occurred since she died. "In 1945, Rip van Winkle was sentenced to six months in a women's prison," the woman went on. "Later died there when she had a spinal infection. We had to make it look like you died of your injuries. Due to a botched surgery to her spine to correct paralysis of the legs, the young lady of twenty-two died." Putting down the file, Blitz then went on to explain a few other things.

Rip let out a soft gasp as she went through the room, she still had some trouble walking around the room, she moved items around for Doc and sometimes she even worked as his assistant. That evening she was working and leaning on a cane, somehow she felt out of balance.

"Still a lame wolf," she looked up as the captain, Hans walked passed her and snatched the cane away. "A wampire does not valk with such things."

"I am vorking hard!" she wanted to yell, but soon found herself almost stumbling back.

He walked passed her as she blushed, he silently just regarded her less with the same interest she held him.

* * *

It was possible that sleeping in a coffin was fair more uncomfortable than having to listen to Doc singing, Rip could not decide, she had enough of his singing and found herself in a private room. "Does it bother you that much?" she turned to see the Major walking passed.

"He has no voice," she whispered and looked rather disinterested in the whole thing. "I could sing _Der Freischütz_when I was nineteen," she told him. "Herr Major, if you don't mind, I could sing Kaspar's part, I know it by heart."

He smiled at her. "You do know vot happens to him at the end of the opera correct, I told you a long time ago."

She nodded. "I do, but I vill alvays admire it."

The song was almost easier to remember than she remembered it in her youth, she had gone to the opera a thousand times. She wanted Hitler himself to look upon as if she was something special, but then lost interest as the opera became almost consuming, the hunter reminded her of her grand father. She wanted the magic musket for herself, she wanted to be the hunter, as her grandfather would hunt and bring down prey.

As she sang, she was not aware that she was performing for just the Major, but for everyone else in his office. She sang until she felt her heart sink at the end of the song, she could remember every word.

"Rip, ven I die, I vant you to have this, I got it from the devil himself," her grandfather told her one evening when he held up his musket. "You know how to load it, you know it because you're the first born child."

She was proud to call herself who she was, she was proud to be a hunter and when the song finished, she did her bit of a salute when someone handed up her musket. She twirled it in the air, caught it and saluted.

"Now that is a performance worth seeing," Rip turned to see the cat boy, Schrodinger clapping his hands and looking pleased. "Hallo again!" He appeared next to her and smiled.

"Schrodinger, you loved her singing didn't you?" she saw Blitz walking up toward the catboy who nodded playfully.


End file.
